


It would not be the first time

by ms45



Category: Dragon Age
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-21
Updated: 2012-09-21
Packaged: 2017-11-14 17:10:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/517591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ms45/pseuds/ms45
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In Nevarra for the meeting of the College of Magi, Wynne encounters a fugitive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It would not be the first time

**Author's Note:**

> If you take Wynne and Alistair back to Ostagar in the DLC, Wynne warns Alistair that "It would not be the first time I woke to a younger man in my bed".

The meeting of the College of Magi was a significant event, a meeting of the world's most sophisticated and erudite practitioners of magic, not to mention an orgy of factional maneuvreing and plain old backstabbing. 

In fact, not to mention a plain old orgy. 

Wynne was, she liked to feel, beyond such shenanigans, although not because of her age. Maker knew the First Enchanter of Cumberland was already rumoured to be fooling about with the Senior Enchanter of Tantervale, although given that both men were crusted-on Loyalists, it was always possible that this was a scurrilous rumour put about by Libertarians.

It was also possible that both of those things were true. 

In any case, the Fereldan Senior Enchanter considered herself to have sown her wild oats, with predictable heartbreak (her own and others), and was looking forward to sharpening her intellect on difficult and seemingly intractable matters of policy, and perhaps also her technical skills. There was a morning session on Herbology that Wynne was quite looking forward to, and she even truly believed it was to improve her knowledge and not just to have a chance to tweak Ines' nose. 

So she was not immediately thinking of physical opportunities when a strange-looking man with a giant sword leapt in through the ground floor window of her inn. She looked about for her staff, having put it under her bed for discretion – even her robes did not advertise prominently that she was a mage, and the innkeeper thought her just a batty old woman – but thought she might be able to knock him out if it came to that. 

He seemed to sense this, but he wasn't there to rob her. “Hide me,” he said in a low voice. She looked around at the bare room – a chest was provided for her belongings, but he'd never fit in there. Taking in his white hair – odd, as he didn't seem very old – she pointed to her bed. “Get in.” He did so, sliding the sword under the bed, and she went back to leafing through her Genitivi Vol. 5 and trying to look like she wasn't waiting for anything. 

Brother Genitivi's memoirs were gripping reading, but she read the same funny passage about an unfortunate encounter with the Dalish about four times before she heard footsteps in the corridor. She resisted the temptation to go out and greet them, and sure enough, they banged on the door aggressively. “Open up in there!”

She flung open the door with a completely unforced expression of disgust. “What business do you have harassing an old woman?!” 

“Did an elf come through 'ere?” The speaker wore battered but effective armour of no particular livery. Mercenaries, then. There were three more hanging back in the hallway.

“I beg your pardon?”

“An elf! We saw 'im come into the alleyway and just disappear. Elves don't just disappear on their own now do they?” 

“I have no idea what you're talking about. Now if you don't mind - “ The man tried to push past her; she put her hand over his face and shouted “WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?”

“That elf's a bad one, ma'am,” said one of the hangers-on. Their leader stood gape-jawed, struggling to process having a little old lady shove him out of her room. “Wanted for murder and theft... and, and...” 

“Kidnapping,” said another hanger-on, helpfully.

“That too, and ...” Wynne thought he might have been about to say “rape” but couldn't bring himself to say it in front of an old woman. 

“Then I hope you find him. Good day to you.” Shoving the leader well out of the doorway, she slammed it with all the outrage of an innocent traveller harassed by armed thugs. She turned and sat back at her table, staring at Genitivi but not seeing, waiting for them to try bursting in again, but instead she heard trudging down the hallway and one of the men saying “You still would,” to crude laughter. 

She sat for several minutes, neither her nor her mysterious visitor stirring, and to be sure, she got up and went downstairs. The only goods of value she had were her person and her staff, and she didn't think he would get much use out of either. Descending the stairs to the main bar, she was surrounded by merchants and mercenaries, but none of the men who had harassed her remained. She bought a bottle of better-than-cheap wine and returned to her room. 

There was still a man-sized lump under the covers, so she sat down and poured herself a glass. “Was he telling the truth?” she said, without looking at him. Silence, then a bit of rustling. “I am an escaped slave,” a muffled voice said. “I thieve to survive. As for murder, I will do what I must to escape my captors.”

“Mmm-hmmmm.” 

Behind her, the elf sat up. “As to kidnapping, I am afraid I could not afford to keep you. You are evidently accustomed to finer things than I can provide.” 

Wynne smiled. “Can I interest you in a glass?”

“You're very trusting for a woman travelling alone. But yes, you can.”

She poured another glass and turned around. When he first burst in she hadn't got a good look – she mainly caught the sword and the hair, completely missed the ears – but now she got the full effect of how bedraggled he was, how thin, gaunt, and... 

He looked down at himself, following her gaze. “They're lyrium. I am … an experiment. My master – my _former_ master wishes to recapture his investment.” He almost spat. 

Wynne, who was well acquainted with lyrium and its effects, was almost speechless, holding out the glass of wine foolishly, as if offering a poultice to a beheading victim. “What an... _evil_ man,” she finally breathed. 

“Indeed,” said the elf, taking the glass from her and skulling it in almost one gulp. Wynne felt a moment of outrage – _that's Chateau Guillerme!_ \- and then felt incredibly stupid and shallow. Amazingly, the elf smiled at her, albeit bitterly. “I'm not supposed to do that, am I?”

“You may do whatever you like, of course,” said Wynne, flustered for once in her well-ordered life. She herself brought her own glass to her nose and inhaled, partly to buy some time to think – as an Aequitarian she was committed to the idea that “magic should be used to serve man”, and sitting in front of her was one of the very worst affronts to that notion that she had ever seen – but also because the deep blackberry-coloured wine called to her, spicy and sensuous, and it took her to a place where people did not experiment on slaves by putting lyrium directly into their skin. 

The lad's accent was Tevinter – what a surprise – and he looked to be maybe thirty or so, allowing for the greater elven lifespan. He would have been devastatingly handsome if not for his haggard appearance, suggesting he had been itinerant for some time. “Have you eaten?” 

The elf looked surprised. “Have I... no. It is no problem. I am used to deprivation.” 

Wynne shook her head, twisting to put her glass back on the table. “Not good enough. I have some preserves. I insist you join me.” It was a little after sundown – Wynne had planned to do a bit of reading and turn in early, but the opportunity to feed her own guest was too good to pass up. As a trusted enchanter of Kinloch Hold she had a degree of freedom not enjoyed by many mages, but the amount of time she had spent in her own room with her own guest was vanishingly small. Even now Knight-Captain Mochrie was in the next room, except that Wynne had seen him downstairs clapping a beefy hand on the back of a city guardsman and raising a toast to King Maric. She was quietly confident that her hospitality would be uninterrupted. 

She opened a muslin bag she always brought on her travels, which contained cured meat, dried fruit, a bit of cheese and some biscuits, and started cutting the meat into vanishingly thin slices. As she did so, she asked “Should I know your name?”

Her guest shrugged. “If you wanted to turn me in, you could have done so. I am known as Fenris.” 

“And I am Wynne. Tell me – how do you come to be jumping into strange women's rooms?”

“I … was foolish enough to think I had found a haven. I forgot that even an elf with a strong back is worth less than a bounty on lyrium.” He laughed bitterly. 

“You need assistance to escape?” Wynne's contempt for slavers was equalled only by a taste for adventure. Already she was thinking of places to hide, reasons for her to have an elven assistant, mentally sizing him to borrow her robes. The elf shook his head. “I would not endanger you. You have done more than enough. Thank you,” taking a biscuit piled high with meat and cheese. He ate with surprising daintiness for someone so obviously undernourished. 

“I can allow you to stay overnight. You would need to leave quite early,” Wynne offered, still wondering about the lyrium. She desperately wanted to ask about the tattoos, and equally knew it would be offensive to ask. 

“Am I being invited to sleep on the floor, then?” asked the elf, a little archly for someone being offered a haven from slavers. 

“Am I in danger from a half-starved waif, then?” The elf shrugged and finished his biscuit, catching a crumb in danger of falling on the floor.


End file.
